Radio Review: In 1996, when Sonia O'Sullivan had had a particularly disastrous Olympics and the nation had slumped into a grade A session of brow beating, O'Sullivan's dad went on air and said, simply: "Nobody died."
And with that, there was a collective cop on - and we saw the loss for what it was, a lost race.
After hearing the tone of Monday's Liveline (RTÉ Radio 1), might I suggest that the producers install a big button labelled "perspective" on the desk in front of Joe Duffy. This simple device would spare listeners a great deal of repetition, because every time a caller was losing it, Duffy could press the button and Mr O'Sullivan's wise words would belt out over the airwaves.
It might have calmed Charlie Bird down - though then again he was on such a fury-fuelled roll, I doubt if even that might have worked. He had discovered that an Ireland on Sunday photographer was following him to find out whether he is romantically attached.
He was, he said repeatedly, being "stalked". What I was really hoping to hear was the paper's editor explaining why he thinks his readers are so terminally dull they'd be interested in such pictures. This is, after all, Bird from Montrose, not Beckham in a Spanish nightclub or Brad post-Jen. Instead, we had Charlie Bird in his most urgent reporterly tone - the one he used when reporting on the tsunami or dodgy banking activities - denying the tabloid's headline by saying "Charlie Bird has no love nest". Hearing him say it once was funny, the second time downright hilarious.
It was a story that would have died last weekend if he hadn't gone on Liveline but RTÉ's top reporter was, of course, trying to make a bigger statement about the right to privacy and media intrusion. It's a subject worthy of intelligent, productive debate but the whole thing got seriously sidetracked by his own personal experience. Bird was privileged to have such access to one of the highest rating programmes on air, so he could have used the valuable airtime to take himself out of the story and dispassionately tease out where the line should be between media interest and media intrusion and to explore a proper system of redress for injured parties. Few could disagree with Seamus Dooley, national secretary of the National Union of Journalists, when he said the paper's actions were "cheap and nasty".
Matt Cooper had a more rounded debate on the privacy issue on The Last Word (Today FM, Tuesday), though it was hijacked somewhat by the combative presence of Liam Lawlor, presumably to talk about what it's like to be on the receiving end of media scrutiny.
"Every decision I ever made in public life I am answerable for," said the former Fianna Fáil TD, jailed a record three times for failure to cooperate with a Government tribunal.
Over on Five Seven Live (RTÉ Radio 1, Tuesday) they went for a more global perspective that wouldn't have provided many crumbs of comfort for Bird. In America, according to legal expert Eoin O'Dell, reporters live by the free speech First Amendment so would be unlikely to call for any curtailment of that freedom; the Guardian's Roy Greenslade said that in Britain, high-profile reporters would be seen as fair game though he did say that celebrities are now starting to hit back and are looking - successfully - to European laws to protect their privacy.
All this media talk is a world away from the people reporter Eivlin O'Rourke talked to (Gerry Ryan 2FM, Monday), even though they are the generation all media outlets are desperate to tap into. An ERSI report found recently that more than half of all secondary schoolgoers have part-time jobs and O'Rourke interviewed some teens to find out why they work and what they do with the money. It was the sort of feature item that the programme does best. An engaging reporter who is relaxed and easy with her interviewees, reporting back to Ryan who's in his element when he's in concerned dad "ah, that's disgraceful" mode.
Some of the teens worked a staggering number of hours - one boy worked every single evening in a pub until 1 a.m.
A disposable income of more than €100 per week was common. O'Rourke pointed out it supported the sort of lifestyle she, as a working adult, wanted. Clothes and a night out were priorities but mobile phones were the big addiction.
One schoolgirl needs €50 a week for mobile phone credit. "They're so obsessed with phone credit, it's like the new heroin," said O'Rourke. It was a short but fascinating insight into how teens think.
But back to the story that started the week. By Thursday, Eamon Dunphy was having great sport with it. "You'll never find my love nest," he taunted the paper (Breakfast with Eamon Dunphy, Newstalk 106). A tabloid taunt if ever there was one.